If you are still reading there are some chances that you want to give R.I.S.K.S. a try.

These are the requirements to meet before continuing with R.I.S.K.S.

Personal resources

  • some understanding of digital threats
  • some understanding of the concepts behind encryption
  • some understanding of Linux
  • some understanding of Qubes OS

It’s hard to quantify how much “some” is.

If you never had any experience with Linux drop R.I.S.K.S., head to the debian handbook and study it. Implement what’s written in the handbook, exercise for a few months and then come back. Hard, harsh but you won’t regret.

If you have some experience with Linux but you don’t feel very savvy, read the Under the hood chapter to see if you can grasp something.

If you have some experience with Linux but you never tried Qubes OS, don’t worry, you’ll be fine. You just need to deal with it for a few weeks before going ahead with R.I.S.K.S.

As long as you take it as a training exercise, my best advice is to try R.I.S.K.S. because it’s risk-free (pun meant).

In the worst case you fail but you can start over again after you beef up a little your knowledge.

Advice: meanwhile learning keep an eye on the Glossary. Some key concepts take a while before they become really clear

You need patience. Not just because it’s hard follow this guide word by word but also because you need to break your usual workflow and habits and rebuild new ones. This is harder than learning any software.

You need discipline.

You need acting skills to manage well your fake identities.

You need time. Depending on your skills implementing R.I.S.K.S. can take from few days to few weeks.

Hardware

R.I.S.K.S. requires:

  • any personal computer dedicated to Qubes OS.
  • an sdcard reader well supported by Linux (either embedded or USB device)
  • at least two empty sdcard (the size doesn’t really matter. 4GB is common and more than enough)
  • a usb pen-drive at least as big as the sdcard
  • an external usb hard-drive

Don’t use the computer dedicated to Qubes OS for anything else. Avoid dual boot. For who’s thinking to buy some second-hand dedicated pc I advise a Thinkpad. All X2* series have a Linux compliant sdcard reader and they can be bought online for a few hundreds dollars.

If you have high privacy and security needs have a look at the Qubes OS HCL compatibility list and cross it with Coreboot supported laptop .

Here there is a list of FSF certified hardware and links to shops selling it.